The Heat
by KatyRose4
Summary: During a heatwave, everyone loses their tempers and the children go back to their old tricks.


"Chrissie, what are you doing?" Tora peered over at her little sister lying on the floor. The summer heat swirled around. The whole house was hazy. Everything was like a popsicle- melting away into the hours until the blissful cold would come. But it seemed that that wouldn't be for a long time.

"It's nice down here."

"Get up."

Simon left his chair and joined Chrissie on the ground. "You know, Chrissie's right. It's more comfortable than you think."

Tora gave a slight huff and helped them both up. "It's humid. That means it's going to rain soon."

"But can't it rain _now_?" Chrissie complained. They all wished for water to fall out of the sky but that would simply have to wait.

The seven children sat in chairs. It was too hot to read, or play with dolls, or even so much as move without feeling fatigued. Sebastian and Lily were already falling asleep. Simon was tired too, but his fingers kept moving with the anticipation of hoping something fun would happen. Or that at the very least a gust of cool wind would enter from the open windows. (No such luck of either.) Pulling a prank probably would have been enough to get them all out of their trance, but they had given up on such naughty things when Nanny McPhee came.

However, the urge for mischief was not a habit to be broken easily, and Simon stood up to declare that they ought to do something brilliant. The children inched closer together, whispering plans for their latest diabolical scheme. Mrs. Blatherwick would be quite in for the surprise.

Meanwhile, Evangeline and Mr. Brown were in the study. Evangeline was trying to work on her reading while Mr. Brown was doing his letter writing. But the sun had burned away almost every brain cell. Words felt like mush and neither of the two melting humans were sure they could recognize or create a coherent sentence.

Although maybe Mr. Brown was capable of forming a full sentence because he yelled, "Damn this heat!" and slapped his hand on the table. Evangeline gave a little jolt. "Sorry." He wiped some of the sweat off of his face.

"The children heard you," Evangeline pointed out in a low voice.

Cedric could just imagine the disapproving looks and laughter at his hypocrisy. He had told them a million times to not curse. In all fairness 'damn' was not that bad of a curse word. Still, they still weren't allowed to say it so it was enough to make him a hypocrite. He could of course argue that he was older and qualified to use any words he wanted to, but then he wouldn't be setting a good example. At least they weren't actually in the room to call him out. (Though Evangeline was right, they had heard him.)

"I don't care." He sulked out of the room without a further explanation of where he was going. It appeared as if his cool composure had also melted with the heat. Which was a shame because at least one person in the house needed to be calm, and she didn't want to fulfill that role. She shrugged, went back to writing, and started to fall asleep.

Mrs. Blatherwick had the worst reaction to the heat and spent every second in the kitchen complaining. She had the best reason though. She was in the stuffiest room of the whole house and was required to stay there all day. And because she had to cook she was surrounded by pots of boiling water- the exact opposite of what she wanted. She wanted ice. Ice, ice, ice, everywhere, ice. She wanted ice in the water, ice on the walls, ice for the floors, ice in her clothes, ice _furniture_ , and even then, she imagined she would still be too hot. Nothing could satisfy her. Still, her frustration was fairly standard and it didn't get worse until later that day. When those annoying little brats got all up in her business.

Nanny McPhee had put them in order, and Evangeline was supposed to maintain that balance, but apparently nothing had changed. The children were probably very impressed with themselves, but for Pete's sake, they've had much better ideas. The day the nanny came they had tied her up, made her believe there was a mouse around, and made a complete mess of the kitchen. They pretended to eat the baby and did dozens of other shenanigans to scare of other nannies. And the best they could come up with was this?

She had stepped away for about fifteen minutes to go to the bathroom and step outside to cool down, and when she came back the kitchen was in disarray. There was water and her cooking all over the floor and every pot and pan was hanging from the ceiling. It wasn't very original, and she wasn't surprised like they had hoped. Any other day she would've complained to Cedric (again) that they weren't allowed to be in the kitchen, and would've carried on with her usual annoyed demeanor. The heat, however, had taken away any and all sense of patience. She was very pissed.

Then the first toy hit her. Then the next. Then another. Apparently the children had grown tired of playing with their toys and instead wanted to torture someone with them. And Mrs. Blatherwick was the unlucky (yet predictable) victim. Couldn't they mess with each other for a change? "Cedric!" she yelled. She ran out of the kitchen (before they could _trap_ her there), and marched into the study, attempting to find her boss.

She found Evangeline asleep in a chair with the book face down on the floor. She looked quite peaceful and happy. But Mrs. Blatherwick didn't care so she just went ahead with her plan. "Where is he!"

"Who?" She was still groggy and very disoriented.

"Mr. Brown! The children are destroying my kitchen!"

"Again?" Evangeline groaned and slowly stood up. The last thing she wanted to do was get up and go all the way to the kitchen, but it was part of her job. Because Cedric was…somewhere. _Where is he anyway?_ She wondered. I mean, it was her job to watch the children and his job to make the money, but he didn't have work that day so they had equal parenting responsibility and he was nowhere to be found so that wasn't fair. In any case there was no use complaining about it.

When they made it to the kitchen the children had left. Surprisingly they saw Mr. Brown. He was sipping directly from a bottle of alcohol. He wasn't drunk yet, but he was definitely on his way and that was enough to make Evangeline upset. It was barely the afternoon! "Put that down right now!" she yelled. She felt like she was parenting all over again. It was ridiculous.

"Evangeline, it's a hot day and I'm boiling. I'm really stressed out right now, and apparently the children have destroyed the kitchen so I will drink as much as I damn please."

"Stop talking like that and stop shouting!"

"I'm not shouting. You're shouting." Yep. They definitely sounded like children.

"Oh God…what has happened to me? I don't raise my voice! I never do that sort of thing...and what about you? You don't drink."

"I don't care what you both do. If none of you are going to punish the little runts, I will." Mrs. Blatherwick took a rolling pin (for protection) and stormed off to figure out some way to deal with them.

 **Author's Note: Just an idea I was toying around with. Not the best quality of work, but hopefully it was enjoyable?**


End file.
